Can the Same Information be Typical and Atypical? How Perceived Typicality Moderates Assimilation and Contrast in Evaluative Judgments

Abstract

The authors investigated how the perceived typicality of context information for a target category moderates whether that information produces assimilation or contrast in the target evaluation. To manipulate context information, the accessibility of either positive or negative exemplars was increased. These exemplars were pretested to seem moderately typical with respect to the target category if participants were not provided with additional instructions. To manipulate perceived typicality, different instructions were provided so that participants categorized the same activated exemplar as either typical or atypical. Information that was perceived as typical resulted in assimilation effects, whereas information that was perceived as atypical resulted in contrast effects. The results showed that the very same context may result in assimilation or contrast as a function of the categorization decisions that operate on the context information.